Experimental and Behavioural Economics
Experimental and Behavioural Economics
The Experimental and Behavioural Economics Research Group (EBERG) draws its membership from economists based at the Economics Department at Warwick who work in the fields of Experimental Economics, Behavioural Economics and/or Subjective Wellbeing (“Happiness Economics”). Experimental methods are used in many fields of economics, including behavioural economics, public economics, labour economics, political economy, game theory, and financial economics. Behavioural economics is an attempt to understand decision-making in the context of the many psychological, cognitive and emotional factors that influence behaviour. Behavioural economists typically build on traditional economic models with insights from psychology or neuroscience. Since behavioural economics concerns the underlying motivations for behaviour it can be hard (though not impossible) to find data to support or develop behavioural theories without the use of experimental methods which explains the close relationship between the two fields.
Experimental and behavioural research are fundamentally interdisciplinary and this is reflected in the fact that the group is linked to other similar groups across the University of Warwick and beyond. DR@W is the overarching interdisciplinary group of all behavioural scientists in Warwick which, together with EBERG, also takes members from the Behavioural Science Group at Warwick Business School and behavioural and experimental psychologists based in the Psychology Department, and hosts a weekly seminar, the DR@W Forum. Many members of EBERG are also affiliated with Bridges, an interdisciplinary centre that includes behavioural and experimental work in its remit that also hosts regular seminars and workshops. Behaviour, Brain and Society is one of the University of Warwick’s global research priorities (GRPs) and the co-ordinator of EBERG sits on the board of the GRP. Several group members are actively involved in the ESRC CAGE centre. Theme 3 of CAGE is led by the co-ordinator of EBERG and has a special focus on subjective wellbeing.
People
Academics
Academics associated with the Reseach Group Name research group are:
Events
WBS Distinguished Seminar Series: Mirta Galesic (Santa Fe Institute)
Beliefs in individual minds are related and can be represented as networks. The structure and dynamics of these networks can be studied on both individual and collective levels. I will present the related ongoing research in our group. First, I will describe analogies that have been used to describe and model belief dynamics, along with their conceptual mileage an baggage (Olsson & Galesic, 2024, TICS). Second, I will describe a model of belief dynamics based on the analogy with systems studied in statistical physics (Dalege et al., 2025, Psychological Review). Third, I will describe two extensions of this model, one providing a framework for a unified model of psychological processes involved in belief dynamics, such as ego projection, social influence, authenticity, and conformity (Zimmaro & Olsson, 2025, arXiv:2502.14362); and the other describing a plausible mechanism for link updating in belief networks (Steiglechner et al., in prep). Finally, I will describe two novel paradigms for collecting empirical data about belief networks, one using natural language processing to extract individual and collective belief networks from comments on news sites (Barolo et al., in prep; Ha et al., 2025, arXiv:2504.08152); and the other using LLM-assisted interviewing and a visual interface to elicit self-reported belief networks (Poulsen et al., in prep). Ultimately, these and related efforts should help us understand and adapt our belief networks to ongoing societal challenges from climate change to intergroup conflicts.